Downgraded care home blames Brexit and funding cuts for staff shortages

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A Merseyside care home which has been downgraded from ‘good’ to ‘requires improvement’ has blamed Brexit and funding cuts for its staffing problems.

Mariners Park care home in Wallasey was rated requires improvement following an inspection in May. The home was rated good in all areas in its previous inspection in October 2016.

Welfare Services Manager Mick Howarth told the Liverpool Echo: “The Brexit uncertainties have reduced the numbers of potential recruits, making the overall pool of staff who are available smaller, and hence recruitment is now reaching crisis point.”

Staffing and recruitment was highlighted in the CQC report, which commented: “It was unclear how people’s dependency assessment information (designed to determine a person’s level of dependency on staff) was used to inform staffing levels at the home.

“Most of the people we spoke with told us the home needed more staff or said they sometimes had to wait a long time for support.”

A resident said: “I sometimes have to wait for medicines. There are never enough staff in these places, not always. Sometimes I have to bawl and shout. A lot of problems are caused by not enough staff.”

Mr Howarth highlighted inadequate local authority as another major impact on care quality and recruitment.

“It is a considerable cause of frustration that the funding from local authorities for care homes lags significantly behind the true cost of providing the level of care residents need,” he said.

The manager said the care home’s charity, the Nautilus Welfare Fund, spent £360,000 last year on the covering the funding gap between care costs and local authority contributions.

The post Downgraded care home blames Brexit and funding cuts for staff shortages appeared first on Care Home Professional.

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